Bikxie aims to solve last-mile connectivity in Gurgaon through its bike taxi service

Last-mile connectivity is a huge challenge in metros, and commuters usually have to deal with ordeals like lack of options (limited to auto-rickshaws and on-demand cab), traffic snarls and dent on wallet. While emergence of shuttle services has alleviated the pain of last-mile connectivity to some extent, they still don't run on all routes and are usually mired by thick traffic during office hours.

To weed out pain for office-goers in Gurgaon, a slew of bike-taxi services, including Bixxie and Mtaxi, launched their services at select metro stations, shopping malls and corporate parks. The latest to make its debut is Bikxie.

Mohit Sharma, Divya Kalia and Dennis Ching floated the two-wheeler taxi platform, currently operational in Gurgaon. It aims to eliminate the problems of last-mile connectivity in the Millennium City.

At present, commuters can hail two-wheeler taxis from select metro stations such as IIFCO Chowk, HUDA and Cyber City. The company has started operations in January this year and claims to complete 2,000 rides and serve over a few hundred consumers. Interestingly, the startup carved out a separate category for women - Bikxie Pink. It's essentially a fleet of scooties that is driven only by women drivers and can be only availed by female commuters.

'Bikxie Pink' was conceptualised based on the company's internal research. “During our research, we observed that while male passengers would opt for a fast and reliable two-wheeler taxi with enthusiasm, female passengers would be reluctant on account of safety concerns and apprehension of riding behind male drivers,” says Divya, Co-founder, Bikxie.

The company initially rolled out with five women-driven and 10 men-driven bikes stationed at IIFCO Chowk. The company offers safety features, including an option of feeding in an emergency contact and SOS button. Bikxie also snapped up seed funding from unnamed investors. When asked about expansion plan, Divya adds, “We want to set our foot in Gurgaon first and then we'll explore opportunities in other cities in Haryana.”

Currently, the company owns the fleet of bikes. However, in the future it will follow marketplace approach as it scales up.

The company competes with Bixxie and MTaxi, however it has an advantage with Bikxie Pink. Motorcycle taxis are an extremely widespread mode for last-mile connectivity in notoriously congested cities like Jakarta in Indonesia. It's also widely popular in China and Vietnam. Over the last six months several bike taxis platforms have forayed in Gurgaon and it would be exciting to see how they evolve in future.

Divya speaks about Bikxie's traction and more in this video interaction with YourStory.